New Years
New Years was very spectacular. It's a major celebration. Fireworks are legal and plentiful. By dark, the firecrackers were continuous and then the aerial displays began. By 11:30 pm the skies were a continuous burst of color as far as you could see. The entire panorama alive from left to right. Our 2nd story back window looks into some vacant area and give us an almost unobstructed view of 20-30 burst at any moment. Finally about 12:15 people started to drift off to bed and things slowed down.
Watermelon
Most produce is trucked from the region during season. Pineapples were piled high at the street stands when we arrived last summer. Now you can only buy them in the grocery stores, trucked in from a dole plantation someplace at 5 times the price. Watermelons started about 6 weeks ago and were pretty good. A few days ago, we bought a small seedless melon from a trike driver loaded with fresh melons grown about 2 hours away. It turned out to be almost as good as the infamous green river melons. We devoured in so fast that we drove back to where they were selling a couple days later and they weren't there. Snooze you lose.
This week the Mango season started. There are mango trees in many yards and so mangoes have suddenly become cheap and fresh. We'll be enjoying mangoes now for a few weeks unrestricted.
Pop Bottle Art
We commissioned a palm tree sculpture from an elderly Pop Bottle artist. She was making Christmas Decorations and selling them from a booth in front of her house. When we received the piece, it was an amazing amount of detail. Take a look below.
Transfer Day Lunch
12 pizzas consumed in 12 minutes flat by 30 people.
This week Thursday was transfer day again. Instead of fixing P&J for the transferring missionary's lunch we opted for pizza. Shakeys 2 for 1 pizzas has long been a missionary favorite. So the night before transfer we drove to the other end of town in rush hour traffic, fought a crazy parking lot to find that Shakeys' at Robinson Mall had closed. So we reverse our route and went to the Shakey's at SM City. We need to preorder 6 orders of pizzas on the 2 for 1 rewards card = 12 pizza. We were informed that we could only buy 2 orders. We persisted and finally the manager agreed to 3 orders. So we purchased 3 orders. The girl said we could come back later and place another order. We wandered the mall for a few minutes and returned to place another order. This time we were told we couldn't order the other 3 until the next day. So we walked 50 feet to Pizza Hut and preordered the rest of our pizzas on their 2 for 1 special. We learned that (1) you can't trick the Philippine system, (2) missionaries like Pizza Hut better than Shakeys and (3) pizza hut 2 for 1 are cheaper than Shakeys. Next time, where do you think we'll go?
Cute Kids
The other night, Elder Dansie walked a couple blocks to an in-home shop to buy "load" for his mobile phone. Along the walk, we accumulated a small group of followers. Kids this young know very little english and so you talk with smiles and high fives.
Trike and Jeepnee Loading
Here are some videos of missionaries loading into a Trike and Jeepnee.